There's a neat thread running between the current debate on foreign ownership of our farms and the ongoing policy cage fight around border protection: in both cases, there is a lot of heat and light in a symbolic issue that speaks to much bigger things.

Whether it's the spectre of asylum seekers weakening our borders or Chinese state-owned enterprises buying up the farm, the real concern remains unspoken - in an uncertain economy, we yearn for a sense of security that is difficult to define.

The Coalition has picked foreign ownership as a political hot-button issue - so significant it has actually developed a policy position: a plan to increase scrutiny for foreign investors in Australian farmland.

As this week's Essential Report shows, views on foreign ownership are complicated. When people are asked whether foreign investment is good or bad for particular industries, there is ambivalence. For some sectors like mining, film, finance, and manufacturing and media, foreign investment is seen as a plus. People get that industries need investment to grow.

Where there is a net negative is in assets seen to be linked to security of the basics of life, like utilities and agriculture; but even here those opposed are less than 50 per cent of the electorate.

Q. Is foreign investment in the following Australian industries good or bad for Australia?

Total good

Total bad

Neither good nor bad

Don't know

Mining

49%

26%

18%

8%

Agriculture

36%

41%

15%

8%

Manufacturing

42%

30%

20%

8%

Film production

59%

12%

23%

7%

Media

36%

26%

30%

8%

Utilities (energy, water)

28%

46%

19%

8%

Finance/banks

35%

31%

25%

9%

Where the debate heats up is around the question of who is buying up the farm - where the idea of enterprises and corporations either backed or owned by Asian governments is seen as more sinister than US and European corporations, a sense that the interests of another state will be more malign than those of global capital only motivated by making money.

Q. Do you approve or disapprove of investment in Australian industries by the following?

Total approve

Total disapprove

Don't know

Chinese state-owned enterprises

23%

60%

18%

Norwegian Government investment fund

34%

42%

24%

US corporations

38%

43%

19%

European corporations

38%

42%

20%

South-east Asian Government-backed corporations

27%

52%

20%

The debate goes up another notch when you put the principle in the context of foreign government control, with nearly a full three-quarters baulking at an active role for foreign governments in the Australian economy, despite the benefits of foreign investment.

Total agree

Total disagree

Don't know

Foreign investment reduces Australia's control of its economy and should be restricted

59%

24%

18%

Foreign investment is beneficial for Australia but foreign governments should not be permitted to control Australian businesses.

74%

10%

15%

Contrast this with the measured responses to the following propositions:

Total agree

Total disagree

Don't know

Foreign investment provides jobs and growth for Australia and should be encouraged

47%

33%

20%

Foreign investment reduces Australia's control but as a medium-sized economy we need it for economic growth.

55%

23%

21%

Foreign investment from countries that share our values, like the UK and the US, is appropriate but investment from other countries, such as China or Russia, is not.

41%

37%

22%

Foreign investment should only be encouraged in sectors of the economy that are struggling, such as manufacturing.

42%

35%

22%

Foreign investment is appropriate given we allow Australian companies to invest overseas.

55%

22%

24%

So what we have is a complex issue where most people recognise there are positive and negative arguments, being fired up by a Coalition to extract maximum emotional purchase - pushing the hot-button issues of farmland and foreign governments.

And it is here that the issue of Chinese investment in farms begins to look a lot like the panic around asylum seekers.

When asked, most Australians accept the need for an immigration regime to build our population base; they accept our obligation to provide safe haven for refugees; they can even articulate benefits from the input of different cultures into the Australian ethos.

But at the same time, there is an insecurity about our place in the world, a sense that we are losing control of our destiny as we see jobs offshored and entire industries closed down.

And this is why the notion of 'border protection' - and the plight of a few thousand asylum seekers from an annual intake of nearly a quarter of a million new arrivals - becomes THE immigration issue.

When the issue first sailed into Australian waters in 2001, our manufacturing industries were struggling to see a future and the world was on the verge of its War on Terror.

The hardline 'we decide who comes into this country' slogan provided a cogent narrative of national leadership for John Howard and gave comfort to many that with a little resolve, Australia could be made safe again.

But the reality is that the same pressures that were driving border anxiety a decade ago are driving our anxiety on foreign investment today.

With the Prime Minister's Taskforce on Manufacturing releasing its report this week, we have an opportunity to turn our national debate to an agenda that really cuts to the heart of our national sense of security - jobs and industry policy.

It will be interesting to watch the response of the Coalition, those champions of national economic sovereignty and border integrity.

On border protection and foreign ownership, the Coalition prosecutes an agenda of government intervention - stop the boats, stop the Chinese Government buying up the farm (or at least make it harder).

Yet on issues like jobs and industry policy, which directly impact upon Australians' living standards and financial security now and into the future, the Coalition appears much more inclined to leave things to the vagaries of the free market.

Slogans around stopping the boats and rebuffing the Chinese shouldn't be a proxy for the real debate about providing security in the everyday lives of Australians - job security, industry-building, working conditions - it's just that they are a lot easier to prosecute.

Peter Lewis is a director of Essential Media Communications, a public affairs and research company specialising in campaigning for progressive social and political organisations. View his full profile here. Jackie Woods is a communications consultant at Essential Media Communications. View her full profile here.

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